Endorphins
by VenitianFuneral
Summary: Edgar attempts to fix his sleep habits.
1. Chapter 1

an: ive never written any of these characters before and need a challenge, so heres this. whatever this is. stream of consciousness, flowery midnight ramblings in the style of Bat Boy the Musical. enjoy, maybe.

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Adjusting to the standard sleep routine commonly shared by most humans with any sort of sense was still somewhat of a challenge to him, finding that his lifelong nocturnal habits couldn't simply be reversed in a matter of months. A "good night's sleep" was still quite a foreign concept to him, his own night's sleep could only be described as patchy at its best, nonexistent at its worst. It also didn't help that Dr. Parker began his days at exactly the time he found himself drifting into unconsciousness.

So every morning at 7am, he'd arise reluctantly and start his own day, only to find himself nodding off somewhere around noon. Mrs. Parker insisted that his rest would improve once he'd adjusted to the cycle, but Shelley would always protest if in earshot: "He'd sleep better if he got to be more active. It's not like he's getting any exercise sitting in here all day!" To which Mrs. Parker would scoff and throw up her arms as she flitted off to another room, leaving Shelley standing poised for an argument and Edgar staring at the doorway, frustrated and drowsy. The woman was anything if unrelenting.

The exchange happened again every so often, until one particular afternoon, Shelley burst dramatically into the family room, sandy hair pinned back and sleeves rolled up practically to her shoulders, giving her an almost stocky appearance that was disproportionate from her thin frame. Edgar could only blink in confusion from his seat on the floor, a giant almanac spread open on his lap.

"We're cleaning the garage!" She announced, arms akimbo, the declaration far too mundane to warrant such theatrics.

"A-are we, then? Is that all?" He set the book aside.

"I mean, I guess, maybe not all in one go. There's loads of junk in there, so it might take, like, more than a day."

Edgar furrowed his brow. "I thought the primary function of a garage was to provide shelter to a car, not junk."

"Well, it'd 'shelter a car' just fine if there weren't so much junk in it." Shelley rolled her eyes and leaned against the doorframe. "I figured some heavy lifting might help you sleep better. Endorphins or something. You know all that science stuff."

"It's actually not the endorphins released through physical activity that improves sleep, it's the gradual dec-,"

"Okay! My bad, professor, but can the biology lesson wait until later?" He blushed involuntarily at that. Endorphins, indeed, but not from exercise. "Look, the garage needed to be cleaned anyway, and either you do it with me, or with my dad this weekend."

Well, the latter certainly was not a viable option, and there wasn't any harm in the former, so why not? He rationalized that the Earth would not change significantly in the span of an afternoon, and besides, how often was it that he and Shelley spent time alone?

With a satisfying thunk, he closed the heavy book and shoved it from his lap, rising to his feet and trotting off after Shelley.

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more to come, probably.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: i guess this is chapter two. i let this one get away from me. hope it's ok.

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Chapter Two

As it turned out, the garage was incredibly cluttered. So cluttered, in fact, that it blocked the interior door from opening, and not even a few hits from Edgar's otherwise rock-hard shoulders could get it unstuck. Shelley stared up at him in exasperation and then slammed her tiny fists against the oak as if that would have made any difference. She scoffed and wordlessly strode down the hall to the front door.

He fidgeted awkwardly in the hallway, having been suddenly abandoned without any sort of purpose being there. His ears followed the sound of her stomping out around the front of the yard and a brief moment of quiet, cut short by a metallic clanging and soft grunts of effort from Shelley herself. After a few seconds of whatever it was she was doing, her footsteps pounded rapidly back to the front door.

It flung open, and she called his name, ragged and hoarse with frustration. Concerned, he followed her shouts and met her, red faced and disheveled.

"I can't get the door open!" She groaned, forcefully brushing a loose strand of hair behind her small, rounded ear. Edgar swallowed, suddenly reminded of his own appearance. Nevertheless, he responded.

"I'm sorry."

She blinked very deliberately and threw her head back a little, eyes suddenly wide and brows drawn. "Wh- fu- why? Did you jam the handle?"

"Well, no, but I thought it polite to offer some sympathy for your apparent struggle." He awkwardly fumbled with his hands, embarrassed, then silently resolved to jam them into the pockets of his slacks.

"Shut up with your sympathy and put your weird caveman strength to some use, okay? It can't all be pickle jars and bottle caps." She turned swiftly and strode down the front path, leaving him flushed with humiliation at the doorway, only making it halfway before she turned to look at him, rolled her eyes, and motioned for him to follow. He stared back, motionless, and she scoffed.

"Come on!"

"I-I can't! I'm not allowed, and- wh-what if someone sees? Dr. Parker will-,"

"Please, Edgar, no one's gonna see, and dad's not gonna find out unless you go and spill." She smiled reassuringly, feeling a little guilty for his current state of distress. "It'll only be, like, one second, anyway. Then you can go and hide in the mountain of garbage in there."

"A-alright, if you say so."

Tentatively, he followed after her, eyes darting up and down the empty street and across the line of trees that sat adjacent to the house. The Parkers lived in a fairly sparsely populated neighborhood, a good acre of trees spanning between each cookie-cutter farmhouse that peppered the small country highway. There were perhaps two other houses he was aware of on that road, one on either side and down a soft incline, and every so often he'd chance a peek out between the blinds and catch the judging eyes of the neighbors, driving by the house at a snail's pace, waiting for any possible chance to become outraged. However, there were no cars that he could see or hear, his ears usually able to pick up the distant sounds of tires peeling and engines rumbling, but all the wind carried was the chirping of birds and the rustling of leaves.

"Hurry up!" He averted his terrified stare and looked up, hastening his stride, and the two stood before the dingy entrance to the garage. Shelley pointed down at the rusted latch.

"I need you to like, _drop the hammer_ on it or something to un-stick it. Just don't get tetanus or whatever." She grinned widely. He didn't understand the turn of phrase, but considering he wasn't carrying a hammer on him, he assumed she was speaking the same sort of nonsense slang she always did. So, he cracked his knuckles, rubbed his callused hands together, grasped the latch, and pulled.

It didn't really seem like he'd put that much weight into it, but the latch crackled loose, sending tiny flakes of rust fluttering about like petals. The garage door opened and flung upwards, earning him a suggestive eyebrow-raise from Shelley and a burning pain in the softer parts of his hand where the rust scraped abrasively, and he turned his head away from his petite companion to behold the sight the ascending door revealed.

Indeed, the garage was filled to the brim with junk. Cardboard boxes adorned with various labels scrawled across them in faded ink stacked mountainous into a dark infinity that he couldn't even fathom. This garage was impossibly huge, having been given no hints as to its size from neither the inside nor the outside of the house. All he could do was stare into the beyond as an immediate feeling of exhaustion washed over him like a riptide. Shelley, unphased, meandered into the cardboard wilderness, maneuvering daintily between towers of boxes and crates.

"I think there's a light switch somewhere in here…" She disappeared within the depths of the garage, and for a moment, Edgar feared he'd never see her again, for she had been lost to the void. But her voice sounded from within: "Augh! Ew! Oh my god, my dad's taxidermies are in here!"

Wonderful. Dead animals. An image of his head stuffed and mounted on the wall forcibly entered his mind. He acknowledged his fate with grim acceptance and a deep breath and he ventured into the unknown to regroup with his lost partner.

After what seemed like an eternal purgatory of things bumping his head or crashing down around him, he found Shelley perched on an old bicycle, reaching for a thin chain dangling from the ceiling. Her hands grasped around for it, despite it being within her reach, and he realized she couldn't see it.

"Hold on, I think I got it." She said, missing it for a fourth time. Watching her fumble around in the dark was painfully tedious, and he took it upon himself to reach around from behind her and pull the chain, just barely illuminating the space. She seemed surprised, jumping slightly and almost losing her balance from the precarious position she'd placed herself in, but managing to regain her composure in time to turn her head, her face inches from his. Just as the notion crossed his mind that the afternoon would take a different, more enjoyable direction, she huffed, smirked, swatted his bicep.

"Stop showing off! I had that!" He scowled slightly as she hopped off the dilapidated bicycle and flitted towards a huge open box of neatly filed papers. She leaned so as to read the label on the side, trying to make out the words, her eyebrows knitted together in confusion. She reached into the box and dislodged a single stack of papers before yelping with disgust and shoving it back into the box. "What the actual hell, dad. Why can't you be a normal person and collect, I dunno, Popular Science or TIME or Playboy or literally anything other than… this."

"What is it?"

Shelley regarded the box with a grimace. "Trash." She said matter-o-factly, taking a squat, fat permanent marker out of her front pocket and scrawling "TRASH" in thick, red letters on the front.

He rationalized that her decision was probably a good one, and if Dr. Parker truly wanted this box of unsavory articles, he wouldn't have left it in the garage. A dusty taxidermy owl looked upon him wisely from the top of a shelf against the wall, giving its own approval.

"Off to a good start then, ah, Shelley?" He said with a jaunty grin. She threw up her arms in a broad gesture.

"This is a nightmare! This isn't a good idea at all! This is just…" Her eyes drifted towards a stuffed deer head the peeked over the summit of a garbage mountain, then down towards the box of unmentionables. "Maybe if I show Mom all this stuff, she'll finally break it off with Dad."

He shifted his attention to a box labeled "Albums", trying to process her outburst. "I know Mrs. Parker is on poor terms with Dr. Parker, but I was under the impression that you were a bit closer to him."

Shelley kicked the TRASH box out of the way, hoisted up a box labeled "Autumn", dropped it on the floor, and began to sift through the contents. "It's not that I don't love my dad, but like, I don't trust my dad. Ya know?" She looked at him expectantly, but all he could do was give her a vacant, wide-eyed stare for lack of a better response. She sighed. "Dad's weird, not in a regular kinda stereotypical 'dad' sorta way, but in a creepy way. I dunno how to describe it. Unstable? He puts me off real bad sometimes, since he drinks and stuff and fights with Mom about, like, nothing. He's weird. I don't know why Mom puts up with it."

"For your sake, I should think."

"Yeah, but what's the point of staying with a guy who takes out his marriage frustrations by drinking and shooting things?" She held up a papier-mache Jack-o-lantern and mimicked the face before stuffing it back in the box, closing the flaps and writing "KEEP!" in huge letters across the top. She sighed again, this time, a little more melancholy. "Sometimes I get scared he's gonna hurt mom, like hit her or something. I can see it in her face sometimes, and I think she's pretty scared too. I don't get her."

Edgar stared into the open box before him, taking in the array of family photo albums within, considering the implications. "I wouldn't let him." He said, finally, closing the box and setting it aside.

A sort of bitter twinge twisted in his stomach, a hot, stabbing feeling of jealousy. How a volatile, mean-spirited man like Dr. Parker could find acceptance among his peers and have a wife and a family while someone such as himself was faced only with ire and prejudice made him feel sick.

"I don't think Dad is all bad." She conceded, gazing up at the ceiling. She was sitting on the floor of the garage, dust motes drifting lazily in the light that surrounded her, making her look ethereal. So much for cleaning the garage. "Maybe Mom leaving would be a wake-up. Like, stop being gross and terrible and be a husband and a dad! No one's gonna want to be around someone like that."

"Ah."

"Sorry, I didn't mean to get all heavy."

"I don't mind. I enjoy listening to you talk."

She waved her hand dismissively. "I don't remember sweet-talking being in your curriculum."

He shrugged, lolled his head to the side. "It's an acquired skill."

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more later.


	3. Chapter 3

a/n: this isn't as long as the last one, i don't think? it certainly isnt as flowery. i still don't know what i'm doing.

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Chapter Three

Following Shelley's earlier lament regarding her father, the two chipped away at the garage box by box in thoughtful silence, labeling boxes and consolidating items very gradually as the back half of the garage was cleared in the middle, a flat space of concrete flanked by two separate groups of boxes.

"It's as if we've parted the Red Sea." Edgar remarked. Shelley stood upright and wiped a bit of sweat from her upper lip with her thumb.

"Too bad we don't have enough favor with God to get him to part the rest." She said flatly, gesturing to the wall of cardboard before them.

"I'm beginning to think that there are very few people who have much favor with him."

She gave him a bewildered smile. "Aren't you a little too naive to be that cynical?"

He cocked his head. "It's something I've acquired over time. Being the way I am and being constantly reminded of it, I'm losing much of my patience."

And to his surprise, her face softened into a concerned frown, a genuine expression of hurt that he rarely saw on anyone's face, much less hers. However, he wasn't sure if her expression was one of sympathy or general irritation with his frequent complaints regarding the subject. She cleared it up in a matter of moments, hesitantly opening her mouth to speak, choosing her words.

"Wish I could say anything other than 'that's the way it is,' but…" She folded her arms and smiled bitterly at the ground. "... That's really just the way it is. People are judgy. Like, it's shit, but they are."

"I'm very well aware, Shelley. And I don't particularly blame them. It's only a defense mechanism."

"A shitty defense mechanism."

He laughed, long and sustained. Her indignation on his behalf was undeniably adorable, however, her prior treatment of him left a lingering sense of unease in the pit of his stomach. It had been many months since she'd come around to him, but if Dr. Parker's behavior was anything to go by, people could be incredibly fickle. He swallowed, watching her stretch to reach a blue plastic storage tub on the top shelf of a previously-hidden workbench.

"Shelley, may I ask you something?" He turned away to preoccupy himself with the nearest possible task, which, to his dismay, was a small box full of dusty picture frames, loosely wrapped in a protective layer of newsprint. The photo at the top of the pile was Mrs. Parker, younger, sitting upright in a hospital bed, holding the apparently newborn Shelley. What struck him about the picture was how similar the two looked, a resemblance now disguised by Mrs. Parker's age. He looked closer at her face, which was drawn in an expression of anguish, a forced smile just barely curling the corners of her lips. Wouldn't the arrival of one's only child be something to happy about?

Shelley had responded somewhat noncommittally while he was lost in thought, and he glanced back to her. "Sorry, what did you say?"

She laughed softly, grinned. "I said 'go ahead,' but if you're just gonna ignore me, maybe I'll change my answer."

Edgar apologized quickly, then glanced down at the picture again, and back up to Shelley. It was hard to imagine she was once so tiny, so shapeless, considering the woman she was now, filled out and curved and achingly beautiful. The round, undeveloped face in the picture became long and slender, with a sharp, pointed chin and small features that were practically elastic in their expressiveness, accentuated by glistening eyes sheltered under a hood of thick lashes.

He wondered what he looked like as an infant. He wondered if somewhere, there was a similar picture of his mother looking down at him, thrown away and forgotten in a similarly cluttered garage.

He licked his lips, chapped and dry, swallowed. "Forgive me if this is an uncomfortable question for you to answer, but I wanted to know how you thought of me."

She blinked, thick eyebrows pulled inward as she considered the nature of his inquiry, hands raised, body language defensive. "What do you mean by that?"

"Do you think of me as human? Or at the very least, as an equal?"

Her mouth opened in a silent "Oh," and she folded her arms under her chest and shifted to a casual stance, hip cocked to the side as her weight was put onto one leg. She swayed. "That's a complicated question." She said finally, gnawing at a sliver of dead skin poking up at the corner of her lip. "It's not something that really crosses my mind at all when we talk or whatever. Like, I don't talk to my mom and think about how she's a human or anything, she's just my mom. Or like, when I talk to Rick, he's just Rick. When I talk to you, you're just Edgar."

"But whenever I speak to you or Mrs. Parker, I'm constantly reminded that I'm not like you, or anyone else." He was more than a little offended by her vague, dismissive answer. She frowned, tilted her head.

"Well, yeah, because you're all hung up on how you look, and I'm not. When you're as self-conscious as you are, you're convinced that everyone's all weirded out by you, or distracted by your appearance, but they're not. The only one who gives a damn is you."

"I don't understand."

She sighed, laughed a melancholy little laugh. "Lemme put it this way… When I was like, 13 or 14, I hated myself. My teeth were all jacked up, I was kinda overweight, and I smelled like a doctor's office. I was terrified to talk to anyone 'cause I thought they'd all be like, staring at my teeth or judging me and stuff. I was gross to look at and to be around."

He doubted that. She continued with her anecdote.

"But I then I lost a whole bunch of weight, started showering more, I looked good. But my teeth were still jacked, and no matter how many people told me I was pretty or said my smile was cute or whatever, I didn't believe them. Like, I still don't. I still can't look people in the eye when my teeth show, because I hate my smile, and I'm always scared whenever I talk to people, they're gonna notice."

"But your smile is lovely, Shelley."

She threw her hands out, eyebrows shot up as her eyes went wide. "See! That's my point! No one else thinks that hard about your flaws, they just think about the person they're talking to! When I talk to you, I don't think about your ears or your teeth or your baldness or whatever, I just think about how cool you are and how much I like talking to you, because you're so much more than your appearance."

He fidgeted a little at the listing of his least favorite features, but at least her intentions were kind enough. "Sometimes when I talk to you, I forget that I look this way."

"Hey, that's progress!" She grinned widely, lips parted over her teeth, and he realized what a rare sight this must be for anyone. An exclusive showing, and he was front row and center.

Her canines were strangely large, jutting out sharply forward, creating a sort of valley of her straight incisors. He had really never noticed before until now when she'd mentioned it, and he still couldn't fathom why she was ashamed of them. If anything, it made her cuter. He smiled back with his own bizarre set of teeth.


	4. Chapter 4

a/n: thanks for the kind reviews so far! i hope this chapter makes sense, because i'm delirious. no, i still don't know where this is going, and yes, i am ashamed of my own sinful hand for writing vague Shelley/Edgar stuff. i'd appreciate it if any and all complaints were written in APA format with works cited, thanks. anyway, on with a chapter, what's point of discussion has probably arisen in literally every other Bat Boy fanfiction on this hellsite.

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Chapter Four

With nearly three-quarters of the garage sorted, it had become increasingly apparent that the entire idea of cleaning the garage had backfired almost completely, the effort only invigorating Edgar to the point of restlessness and leaving Shelley feeling particularly spent, as well as vaguely envious of the energetic flourish that now accompanied his every movement.

He'd managed to pry open the swinging hatch to the attic above and could hardly contain his delight as he swung in and out of the opening, packing away heavy boxes tucked beneath his arm as he climbed deftly with the other. Shelley watched him listlessly, an annoyed grimace tugging at her dainty features. She slumped heavily against the drywall, allowing gravity to guide her body to the dusty cement floor, her knees pulled up to her narrow chest, arms fallen limply at her sides. She exhaled loudly, shift her body forward to let her forehead rest between her knees.

"Stop showing off, bat boy, you're making me tired." She hugged her shins and peeked overtop her knees, the lower half of her face hidden as intense, pale eyes glared wearily up at him. He tumbled out of the attic haphazardly, just barely managing to land in a crouched position, facing her.

"We're almost done, though."

"More like, this was a mistake and I wanna take a nap."

The childish pout she was most certainly wearing showed even in her eyes, and he chuckled almost paternally. He moved awkwardly across the floor to sit next to her, upright against the wall, minding his posture and folding his hands in his lap.

"You'll ruin your own sleep schedule if you nap now."

"What about you? Aren't you feeling even a little tired?"

He said nothing because they both knew the answer to that question. She sighed, and he smiled gently, hoping to look reassuring, but knowing his gaunt face, sunken eyes, and thin lips, he probably looked like he was sneering. To his relief, she looked up at him over her shoulder and smiled tiredly, a serene and motherly expression that made her look like a completely different person sometimes. She was beautiful, and he swallowed the pleasant ache in his throat that this smile always seemed to conjure.

Without thinking, he reached forward and tucked a bit of her hair behind her ear, and she did not flinch.

"This was a lost cause from the start, wasn't it?"

He rested his head against the wall, the chill of its surface manifesting a river of goosebumps over his bare scalp and down the back of his neck, coming to a smooth end just under his shirt collar. "On my behalf, yes, it was." She frowned, clamped her eyes shut and buried her face in her knees again, the strands of hair falling forward from behind her ear. Something about the sight of his affectionate gesture coming undone made him sad.

"But there's a silver lining to this, isn't there?" He offered to the back of her head. "The garage is significantly cleaner than it would have been otherwise."

She mumbled gibberish that even he couldn't understand. He patted her back lightly with the tips of his fingers, hoping his touch was inoffensive. "And at least we were able to spend time together."

She moved a little, pressing her lips to her knees. Tilting his head, he could see a rather pensive look gracing her features.

"Nobody talks to me like you do."

He blinked. She turned her head to face him.

"Mom talks to me like a spoiled little brat. Dad talks to me like I'm not worth his time. Rick talks to me like I'm his new puppy. And everybody else, I'm some blond teeny bopper with an annoying voice and opinions that don't matter." She looked so serious, her voice rough and firm, womanly, so different from her cheerful, girlish soprano. He couldn't tell if she was throwing her voice or not. "You and me… actually talk about things. You make me think."

He was unsure of how to respond to such a strange confession.

"Y'know Rick doesn't know anything about me? He never asks. He's cool with the surface, and I hate that. I hate it so much." Her voice cracked.

Oh boy. Rick. His favorite topic.

"Are you in love with him?"

She looked up, wide-eyed, red-faced, and he thought he'd offended her with such a blunt, insensitive question, but she responded, low and calm.

"N-no. No. I'm not." She hugged her knees to her chest.

"Then why do you tolerate his poor treatment of you?"

Immediately, she snapped: "I mean, it's like, what is there else? It's not like I could find anybody else if I left him. Who'd want me, right?" She sniffed, tears welling up in her eyes, he felt uncomfortable. "They'd come for the Surface Shelley, the cute chick from the glee club with the perky boobs and the empty head. And then you dig, and there's the baggage. All my insecurities and my family drama and my mood swings. It's a downer. Even for me."

She inhaled deeply and let it out in a long, shuddering breath that seemed to last a minute. "And if they don't like it, they can walk away. But what if you don't like yourself? What do you do?"

That was something he'd never fully considered, but he knew all too well what she meant. "You and I are very similar, I think."

She sniffed. "Oh, yeah?"

"Looking at it objectively, we both have allowed the opinions and the actions of others to shape our self-images. And perhaps, if I may, offer some observations from an outsider's perspective to ease your mind?"

"I mean, I guess? Are you gonna lecture me or something?"

"Of course not." He shrugged, leaned back against the wall, casting his eyes upward to the ceiling. "People are so multifaceted that it's baffling to me that the concept of personal depth could be anywhere close to repulsive. I suppose it's as you said, judging one by their appearance is instinctual, for defense and breeding alike. The fact that an individual can be put-off by another individual for simply being a person is such a repugnant characteristic to have."

She nodded slowly. He continued.

"But shouldn't the sense of mystery be something attractive as well? Learning to know and understand another being and watching as their history unfolds in every word and action? This is something that draws me to you, and that is that you are a mystery that I thoroughly enjoy unraveling."

A sly grin crept over her lips. "Are you coming onto me?"

"Interpret it how you will, but the depth of your person is fascinating to me, and I enjoy talking to you. There hasn't been a single thing you've told me or that I've learned about you that has made me think any less of you."

She leaned back against the wall, stretched her legs out before her, coming to rest, slouched shoulders brushing his own.

"I'm glad you like me for who I am." She said quite matter-of-factly. "Now that I know you won't think less of me, I thought you should know that I'm a cannibalistic mass-murderer, and my thirst for blood will never be quenched."

She said this so casually, face deadpan, that it caught him entirely off-guard and he burst into hysterics.

Finally, after a few deep breaths, he said: "If you can accept me as a freak of nature, then I can accept your psychopathic tendencies."

"Please, don't even start with that." She scoffed. "If a sweet, intelligent guy like you is a freak of nature, then nature needs to get her priorities straight, and stop making so many jackasses."

"What would you consider me to be, then?"

Shelley shrugged, laid her head on his arm, gazing at nothing in particular. "Human."

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a/n thanks for reading. if you like this schlock, then check out my profile for a link to my comic. it's the same damn thing.


	5. Chapter 5

this one's not as good as the others.

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Chapter Five

Cleaning the garage was definitely a physically demanding task, bound to result in an awkward-yet-satisfying amalgamation of stiffness and soreness in the morning. Taking a moment to really absorb his surroundings, the garage space itself was rather pleasant; very quiet, confined, and warm, a stagnant heat that was uncomfortable at one point during the day, but had steadily become soothing. Something about it reminded him of the cave he'd grown up in, dim and slightly humid. The modern structure he'd become accustomed to in the past few months was too linear, too artificial, the air circulated by the conditioner was stale, a dry, permeating chill that was unsettlingly unnatural. Electricity created a perpetual buzz, a low hum that was on a frequency high enough for him to hear. Machinery and technology and gadgets whirred and clanked and growled. This human world gave him a headache.

But in the garage, the only sounds were of the electric sizzling of the single light bulb overhead and the low drone of complete silence. It let his mind rest. His muscles relaxed. He closed his eyes and counted his own breaths.

In. Out. He'd tried this nightly to lull himself into unconsciousness, but it never worked.

Exercise early in the morning or afternoon is, without a doubt, one of the better ways to combat sleeplessness, due almost entirely in part to homeostasis. During activity, internal body temperature rises, and the steady decrease in temperature as the day goes on is what contributes mostly to fatigue. He had thought earlier that this afternoon had proved to be almost over-stimulating, entirely certain that this would be a restless night, but the heaviness of his eyelids now suggested otherwise.

In. Out.

Shelley's warmth radiated outward, creeping into his skin and sinking into his bones and settling there, the still silence allowing the faintest sounds to reach his ears, the gentle rhythm of her heartbeat, the whistling of air as she breathed, the lower notes of a melody Mrs. Parker was humming somewhere within the main part of the house, wooden beams creaking within the walls. From some part of the garage, there was what sounded to be the scuttling of a small animal, probably a rodent, and he made a mental note to return to the garage for a quick meal after the rest of the family had gone to bed.

But then again, smaller rodents didn't taste particularly good. A bit sour. Larger mammals were sweeter, some with different aftertastes than others. Humans had very robust blood, strong and thick with a multitude of flavors that presented themselves seemingly both simultaneously and individually. He involuntarily clenched his jaw, rolled his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

In. In. Out.

Shelley had nodded off next to him, breathing deeply yet delicately, her thin frame dead weight against him, her head resting on his shoulder. She had so many smells, so many of them unbelievably pleasant. The sugary scent of her hair, an artificial floral aroma that lingered around her and on her clothes, the natural, savory scent of her skin. Sometimes the phantom smell of her would hit him when he'd least expect it, and his mouth would water. He'd wonder sometimes how she tasted, but only for a second. If he'd learned anything truly significant in the way of social skills these past months, it was that you don't bite your friends, something that was probably common sense to most, but a genuine challenge for him. The challenge diminished as his attachment to his surrogate family members grew.

In. Out.

Warm, comfortable, safe. Very safe. His paranoia was practically perpetual, so it was rare to feel so at ease. Safe. Warm. Comfortable. Hungry. Tired. Hungry. His fingers twitched. Each breath took in a slew of appetizing scents.

In. Out. In. Out. Out. Out.

Shelley inhaled deeply, exhaled, shifted.

"Shelley."

"Mmm…?" She responded drowsily, not moving much. He nudged her lightly with his elbow.

"If you're going to sleep, at least go back inside. I imagine your bed must be more comfortable."

She groaned. "You're comfier."

"Don't tease." He smirked. "I don't provide much lumbar support, anyway. You'll be sore if you stay here."

She groggily groped at his bicep. "Maybe we should trade you in for a memory foam bat boy."

"Is that legal?"

She laughed, sat up straight, stretched her arms over her head and yawned. She looked back to him and grinned. "I guess there really is no point in hanging out in here anymore. I've probably got a whole colony of dust mites living it up in my lungs by now."

He cringed at the thought. She stood up gracefully, arching her back and stretching again. "What do you propose we do now?"

She cocked her head, sandy hair falling over her shoulder, lips pursed. "God, what time is it, even?"

In a few fluid strides, she moved to the door that led back into the house, opening it and slipping through. Footsteps echoed softly through the hall that stretched into the den, and he heard a small yelp before she scurried back inside. Her face peeked into the garage from around the heavy door, a slight blush across her cheeks.

"Um, it's totally night right now."

"What?"

"It's like, 7 pm. Oh my God." He rose to his feet and stumbled towards her, his left leg irritatingly numb from the position he'd stayed in. She retreated back into the house, and he followed, the chill of the air conditioning catching him off guard. "We were cleaning for five hours."

Shelley padded softly into the den with Edgar at her heels, and suddenly Mrs. Parker flounced into the room with a broad, toothy smile on her face. She was wearing an apron and wielding a meat cleaver. Edgar stopped dead in his tracks purely out of the shock of seeing such a spritely, bubbly woman carrying a dangerous object with startling carelessness, but Shelley was nonplussed and continued walking. Mrs. Parker was the first to speak.

"There you are! And here I was almost starting to worry!" Mrs. Parker chirped, the cheerful inflections so utterly forced that it sounded almost sarcastic. She clutched the meat cleaver in her hands at chest level, as if she were holding a bouquet of flowers. "Are you kids hungry? There's a tuna casserole on the stove."

Then why the meat cleaver? Her plastic smile twitched as she and Edgar made eye contact. Shelley had already glided into the kitchen and was rummaging through the pantry. Mrs. Parker lowered the cleaver to her side as her shoulders relaxed, and her smile softened into one of genuine warmth. There must've been some sort of look on his face, because she stepped over to him and patted his shoulder with her free hand, a maternal gesture that she had mastered flawlessly.

"How do you feel, sweetheart? Any better?" Everything this woman said sounded like a song; she could even make the phone book sound like a lullaby. He laughed a little, feeling a bit guilty.

"Well, I'm not exhausted, if that tells you anything."

"I'm sure you'll adjust soon, dear. Perhaps you can convince Thomas to give you a sedative with your medications?" Her dark eyes were glistening and earnest, and he wished for the same blissful optimism. He also wished he could tell her the truth, that there were no medications, that eating the same food as the rest of the family made him painfully ill, but how do you tell your adoptive mother that you drink entire IV bags of animal blood in her guest bathroom on a nightly basis? So he smiled, nodded.

"Sure, I'll ask him."


End file.
